Buhari’s Administration Claim on Rice Production False, Says Atiku •Says Nigeria imported 3m metric tons of rice in 2018

The presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, has said the claim by the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari that it has increased rice production in the country is false.

Atiku in a statement issued on Tuesday by his campaign organisation said the recently released data from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) World Markets and Trade Report has proven the claims by Buhari and his government to be false.

The Buhari’s government had bragged that its biggest achievement is reducing Nigeria’s dependence on foreign rice.

President Buhari boasted about it when he told British Prime Minister, Theresa May, on April 16, 2018, that: “We have cut rice importation by about 90 percent; made a lot of savings of foreign exchange and generated employment. People had rushed to the cities to get oil money, at the expense of farming. But luckily, they are now going back to the farms. Even professionals are going back to the land. We are making steady progress on the road to food security.”

Atiku noted that the Minister of Agriculture, Chief Audu Ogbeh,  on May 2, 2018, also made similar claim.

According to Ogbe, “Unemployment in Thailand was one of the lowest in the world, 1.2 per cent, it has gone up to four per cent because seven giant rice mills have shut down because Nigeria’s import has fallen by 95 per cent on rice alone.”

The former vice-president, however, noted that the “World Markets and Trade Report of the USDA, which is a public document disclosed that Nigeria imported three million metric tons of rice in 2018, which is 400,000 metric tons more than the quantity of the product imported in 2017.

“It does not end there. The report shows that there has actually been a steep drop in commercial rice production from its 2015 peak under the previous Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) administration.”

Quoting the report further, Atiku added that “Nigeria had consistently milled 3,780,000 metric tons annually-a drop from 3,941,000 metric tons recorded in 2015.”

Atiku, therefore, appealed to  Buhari and his government to be truthful to the Nigerian public, rather than claiming progress they have not made, “because no matter how far and fast falsehood has travelled, it must eventually be overtaken by the truth.”